On Saturday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Weekends with Alex Witt,” Congressional Black Caucus Chair Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH) argued that police officers “could shoot in the air” and that “Teachers go and break up fights with knives every day.”
Beatty said, “We have to have a better way of de-escalating. Here is an occurrence where the police knew they were coming with two girls fighting — or a girl and two adults fighting. So, I think we have to look at the system. one size can’t fit all. You can’t say that you are trained to only shoot to the center of the body. Four shots, I mean, come on, the first shot would knock the knife, a kitchen knife to the ground. And when you look at what’s happening here in Franklin County, I’m embarrassed by it. When you look at the number of percentages of fatal shootings at the hands of law enforcement, when you look at, we’re rated 18th out of 100 of the largest, most populous cities in the nation. We need to take a longer look, a better look, rather, at our system. How are we training police officers? I find it unacceptable that one way of training, one system, one size cannot fit all. You cannot put four bullets into a 16-year-old’s chest. You can’t put six bullets into a person’s back. Now, we’re going from a kitchen knife, a sandwich, a cell phone, car keys. We have to call for more transparency, more training, and more justice.”--
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